Over the weekend, news broke that the Justice Department is scrutinizing a joking text message that former President Donald Trump's Chief of Staff Mark Meadows sent to his son, making light of the administration's efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election at the exact same time he was pushing conspiracy theories to senior DOJ officials to try to get them to lean on various states.
This is massively significant for two reasons, said Tom Dupree, a high-ranking official from the George W. Bush administration's Justice Department, on CNN Monday. First, Meadows' silence has triggered speculation he may be cooperating with the DOJ in its investigation into Trump and, second, this is clear evidence even Trump's own inner circle didn't believe the lies they were pushing.
"We heard from ... Mark Meadows asking where is he in all of this," said anchor Bianna Golodryga. "We learn that federal prosecutors are interested in a specific text exchange where he apparently joked about Trump's election claims. The Washington Post is reporting ... that Meadows 'wrote to a White House lawyer that his son, Atlanta-area attorney Blake Meadows, had been probing possible fraud and found a handful of votes cast in dead voters' names, far short of what Trump was alleging. The lawyer responded that perhaps Meadows' son could locate the thousands of votes Trump would need to win the election.'"
Given all of that, Golodryga continued, "What do you of the then-White House Chief of Staff joking about election fraud?"
"Well, first thing I would make of it is if Mark Meadows has flipped, I would be concerned if I was Trump's team," said Dupree. "And he's been suspiciously silent for the last few months, and I think, given that there is a good chance that he may face potential exposure, that he is cooperating."
"As far as the text exchange, it is remarkable to see how many of the behind-closed-door exchanges may turn out to have significant implications," continued Dupree. "Here, the obvious implication is that the Chief of Staff knew full well that they didn't have remotely sufficient evidence to change the outcome in any state, let alone the multiple states he needed to stay in office. So from the special counsel perspective, it is a gift from God, in that he could go before the jury and say, look, these guys are saying one thing publicly, but behind closed doors, here is what they believe."
Tom Dupree says Jack Smith has "gift from god" in Meadows textwww.youtube.com
